Army Gen. H. Norman Schwarzkopf’s spokesman has dismissed as a “hoax” a Palestine Liberation Organization transcript that quotes him as saying U.S. forces fought Iraq “for Israel.”
The transcript, which has the four-star general making disparaging comments about Saudi Arabia’s role in the war, was obtained by Hassan Abu Rahman, director of the Arab League’s Palestine office here.
Rahman forwarded it to the National Association of Arab-Americans, which then provided it to the Hearst news service.
The PLO said the Schwarzkopf interview was conducted by Israeli army radio, but it denies it ever interviewed Schwarzkopf.
Army Maj. Olin Saunders, a spokesman at the U.S. Central Command in Tampa, Fla., told Hearst, “This interview did not take place. It is a hoax.”
Ruth Yaron, the Israeli Embassy spokes woman, called the transcript “a cheap and desperate ploy by unnamed adversaries who would use any measure to drive a wedge between Israel and the United States.”
Referring to “anyone who would fabricate something like that and embarrass our friend (Yasir Arafat),” Rahman said that such a person “would not be in a good position.”
He added that reports about the purported phony interview have been “blown out of proportion. It does not deserve all this attention.”
“I believe that whether they fought for Israel or not, it is a beneficiary of this war,” Rahman said. “The Israelis say so. The Americans agree that this war served the interests of Israel.”
JTA has documented Jewish history in real-time for over a century. Keep our journalism strong by joining us in supporting independent, award-winning reporting.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
